A Day at the (Water) Park
by kamikaze2007
Summary: Pregnancies are a learning experience for everyone involved, and usually women retain what they learn form their first pregnancy to apply it to their second. Sumia, however, doesn't have the hindsight to do that, especially when Lucina's just SO excited for the water park trip.


Being pregnant was a learning experience, and no amount of preparation could truly prepare someone for the trials of carrying a child. For some, even the first pregnancy couldn't help make the second one any less painful or surprising. This was especially true for Sumia who, as soon as she learned she was going to bear Chrom's second child, immediately forgot everything she learned during her first term. She was frantic, and Chrom did everything he could to help ease her worries, though when things got really bad, there was only so much she could do.

The young Lucina wasn't helping matter any, either. In her naive attempts to help, she wound up suggesting that Sumia do several otherwise relaxing things that weren't appropriate for pregnant women to do, such as down very large cups of coffee, paint her nails, and even color her hair, some of which came as a surprise to Sumia as well, who wouldn't have thought to look up that information like her husband did. Whenever Lucina had a suggestion for her mother, a phone would be pulled out to look up just what negative effects that could have on the body. Something that Sumia appreciated, but didn't find entirely necessary. "I don't see why you have to look that stuff up every time Lucina wants to do something. It's not like every little thing is going to make our second baby worse off than the first one," she said in one instance of Lucina suggesting a playful activity.

Chrom shook his head as he tapped away on his phone. "That's what you said when I looked up nail painting, and as much as a surprise that was to all of us, I don't want to take any other risks."

Sumia sighed and crossed her arms. "You're doing this because I forgot everything from the last time, aren't you?"

"Glad to see we're on the same page," Chrom nodded.

This trend continued well into Sumia's pregnancy, but the one instance that was so obvious nobody should have been looking it up came one day, mere days before her due date. A very excited Lucina tugged at her mother's sleeve and pushed a flier for an amusement park at her face. "Mother, mother! I want to go to the water park!"

Sumia looked to her daughter with a raised eyebrow. "The water park? Why?"

"My friends are gonna go and I wanna go too," Lucina said, hopping excitedly as she did. "But I don't wanna go without my mom and dad going with me."

Taking the flier from Lucina, Sumia nodded understanding and put a hand on her chin. "Yeah, that makes sense. Let's go ask your dad."

"Yay!" Lucina bounced after her mother as they ventured into the house to find Chrom.

His immediate response was to take a pointed look at Sumia. "You did tell her no, right?"

Sumia looked around nervously as Lucina's face fell. "Er, should I have? I told her we should ask you."

In response, Chrom knelt down to Lucina's level. "Lucina, I hate to break it to you, but there is one very important reason we can't go to the water park." His tone interested Lucina, so she tiled her head, asking why not. "Because," he said, placing his hand on his wife's stomach, causing her to squeal. "Your mother is very...very pregnant. Water parks have a lot of rides—"

"Rides!" Lucina parroted, clapping her hands together. "I wanna ride some water rides!"

Chrom raised his free hand to calm Lucina. "Let me finish. Water parks have a lot of rides that pregnant women are not allowed to ride."

"Really?" Sumia asked.

Chrom nodded. "Have you read those signs? I guarantee you each and every one of them will say something along the lines of 'please do not ride if you are pregnant or have a heart condition.' Lucina, if we go to the water park, your poor mother will have nothing to do. She won't be able to ride any rides with you, she'd have to walk all day, which is hard on swollen feet, and she would be miserable."

Lucina nodded and looked to her feet, contemplating this new information.

Chrom took her silence as a cue to continue. "So you have two options: You can go with your friends, but your mother and I will stay home, or you can not go at all."

Lucina sighed dramatically, causing Chrom to roll his eyes and Sumia to fall for the act immediately. "But dad, that's no fair! I want you guys to have fun too."

"I understand, but it will be a while before your mother will be able to have fun at water parks again."

These words caused Sumia to pout and cross her arms. She picked the saddened Lucina up and held her as best she could, her swollen stomach getting in the way. "I want to go," she said simply.

"Pardon me?" Chrom asked.

Sumia took a deep breath before speaking again. "You said it would be along time before I could enjoy a water park again, so I'm going to go with Lucina, whether you want me to or not."

Chrom sighed, inwardly cursing his poor word choice. "Sumia, you know you won't be able to do anything, right?"

Sumia nodded confidently. "I know," she assured him. "But I'll have plenty of fun just because I'll be able to watch my little girl have fun at her first water park experience."

Lucina clapped and wrapped her arms around her mom's neck. "Aw, yay! I love you, mommy."

Chrom heaved a deep sigh. He realized Sumia's mind was made up, and any attempt to change it would sadden Lucina, which was not a risk he was willing to take. "Alright, fine."

Sumia shrugged and set Lucina down. "I mean, you don't have to go, you big grump."

"And be away from you this close to your due date? No way," Chrom said firmly. "I'm going to."

Sumia's stern expression turned to a smile. "Great! Now we need to get Lucina a swimsuit!"

"And a new one for you," Chrom chimed in. When Sumia looked at him with a confused look, Chrom waited until Lucina wasn't looking to pantomime a giant stomach and then put his hands on his chest and mimed breasts growing as well. Sumia's face heated up and she gulped as she nodded understanding.

The shopping trip to get new swimsuits the next day was one full of excitement for Lucina, and a few tears for Sumia, as trying on swimsuits was exhilarating for the small child, and stressful for the mother. On the bright side, watching the spectrum of emotions Sumia and Lucina went through was amusing to Chrom, and he laughed about it to himself, even while being a supportive husband and telling Sumia that they all looked good on her.

Except the one that was very obviously too small, and looked like it was about to snap under the strain of Sumia's swollen breasts.

Once that shopping trip was over, all that was left was the actual trip. After comunicating with the mother of one of Lucina's friends and learning that she would be driving a full car, Chrom decided to bring a different kind of chaperone. One who was very confused about his role in this whole thing until he asked Chrom to explain in front of the water park. "So tell me why you had me come in a different car when we live very close to each other?" He asked, running his hand through his blonde hair.

Chrom put a hand on Lucina's head. "Because, if Sumia starts to give birth while we're here, we don't want to drag Lucina away from her friends."

The idea was starting to dawn on the visitor. "Ah, I see! So when your gal pops, you'll skedaddle, and I'll be drivin' her home once today's all said 'n done!"

"I don't appreciate that wording, but yeah, that's the gist of it," Chrom confirmed.

"Thanks again for doing this, Vaike," Sumia said. "We tried to get a hold of Frederick, but he was busy today."

"As was Lissa," Chrom nodded. "...Those are unrelated appointments, just to be clear."

"Hah, I gotcha," Vaike said, pointing a thumb at himself. "You just wanted to compare summer bods with Teach!"

Chrom shook his head. "No, trust me, you were seriously our last option."

"Well I'll show ya that Teach's beach bod can't be beat! Let's go change!" With that, Vaike shot off into the park, ready to be overly competitive in every field he possibly could.

"He's so weird," Lucina giggled.

"Yeah, but we trust him," Chrom sighed. "Let's get going."

Second later, Vaike came running back, a worried look on his face. "You guys have my ticket, right? Teach can't get in without it."

Chrom produced four tickets from his pocket. "I've got all of our tickets; if you'll just slow down, I'll give you yours."

Vaike flashed a toothy grin and gave Chrom a thumb's up. "Thanks a bunch!"

The first hurdle to overcome came as early as the dressing rooms, which Sumia came out of with red eyes and heavy breaths. Chrom's heart broke as he saw her expression and he wrapped an arm around her. "What's wrong, Sumia," he asked, knowing full well what the problem was.

Lucina's answer was the one that came. "Mom's crying because she's fat again."

Despite trying his hardest to be reassuring, Chrom nearly doubled over in laughter and even Sumia had to stop herself from laughing. "Lucina, not in front of your friends," she said, making a half-hearted attempt to scold her daughter.

"Let's go find your friends," Chrom said, moving from his wife's side to Lucina's. "And let's...not tell them that part."

As soon as they got moving, Vaike arrived at Chrom's side and put his arm around his shoulder with almost as much intensity as a tank. "Heya Chrom! Nice swim shorts, dude. Love the mark of Ylisse on your butt. Maybe I should call it the mark of Yl-ass instead?"

"Stop it with the language around my daughter," Chrom snapped, face heating up as Sumia giggled at Vaike's awkward wording.

"And my friends," Lucina added, pointing to a small group of children only slightly younger than her surrounding a jolly man.

One child had hair to match the jolly man's and nervously pushed up his glasses, surveying the area. The other was a dour boy with slicked back orange hair, which was a weird sight, since everyone else knew his hair would give way after hitting the water once. The third was a visibly moody girl with sandy-blonde pigtails whose expression lightened the moment she saw her friend. "Hey, Lucy's here," she shouted, causing everyone to meet Lucina's group.

As they reunited, Chrom nodded at the other adult present and raised a hand to say hello. "Hey, I didn't think there would be other adult supervision here," he said, causing the man to laugh.

"Of course! We could not let our Laurent and his friends wander around such a huge water park without the supervision, you know? So Gregor came to keep the eyes on them."

Chrom nodded understanding. "So you drove all these kids?"

"Aye," Gregor nodded. "I would have offered to drive your Lucina, but these kids fill up Gregor's truck already."

"I understand," Chrom said with a shrug. "We've got a carpool in case something happens with Sumia while we're here."

"Great!" Gregor cheered. "So, is everyone, Laurent?"

The bespectacled kid nodded. "This is everyone, father."

"Then shall we? Lots of fun to be having, kids!"

The first stop was the huge wave pool, the sight of which caused Vaike to jump into the air and drag Chrom along with him into the water, shouting dares about who could go farther in and not get swept away by the waves. While he was being dragged along, he shot a worried glance at Sumia, who sat at one of the beach chairs surrounding the wave pool and gave him a thumb's up. The children (and evenly matched adults) could have played in the wave pool alone all day, but this was a water park, and rides were calling their names. Several long waiting times passed, all of which ended with Sumia watching everyone else embark on rides, barely getting a drop of water on her the entire time. Finally, the kids started getting tired of waiting for rides and made tracks towards the lazy river, which Sumia had been looking forward to all day as the only ride she could actually get on. Unfortunately, something between the most recent ride and the lazy river sidetracked Chrom and Vaike so bad, everyone had to stop for it. Vaike saw it first, grabbed Chrom's arm, and pointed at several poles with timers on them standing at the foot of a couple of slides. "Chrom, is Teach hallucinating, or are those timers?"

Chrom observed the scene and nodded. "Uh, yeah, it looks like that slide's timed for...races."

Vaike nodded. "Yeah, and it looks like lots a' people can race at once..."

The two looked at each other, broke out in grins, and ran to get in line. Lucina followed after, wanting to ride the same ride as her father, and Gregor went as well, making Laurent, Gerome and Severa promise to stay with Sumia. Not happy with her journey to the lazy river being delayed, Sumia crossed her arms and took a seat at the nearest bench. At least Severa's similar reaction was good for a laugh or two.

Luckily, since up to eight people could ride the race slide at a time, the line moved quickly, so Vaike, Chrom, Lucina and Gregor were back quickly, Lucina laughing as the adults arguing over who won. "I'm tellin' ya, my timer was broken! This is bull!"

Chrom shook his head vigorously. "No, all of our timers worked fine, and I clearly splashed down before you did. Just ask anyone who was watching."

"Gregor was a bit...preoccupied," Gregor admitted. "Hard to pay the attention when water is all in your face."

Lucina nodded. "Yeah, I wasn't watching you either."

"Okay, then Sumia can tell us," Chrom said as they approached the subject of his sentence, who looked at them with a raised eyebrow.

Vaike shook his head and continued arguing, not bothering to answer her unspoken question. "Nah, Sumia'll lie to get on your good side!"

Chrom barked a laugh. "You've never interacted with Sumia when she's pregnant, then. She pulls no punches."

Finally, Sumia spoke up, standing and motioning for everyone to head to the lazy river. "Who am I punching? Why am I punching them?"

"Chrom thinks ya'll know which of us splashed down first on that race," Vaike explained.

"No, I wasn't watching," Sumia said flatly. "I was a bit distracted by the crippling pain ravaging my body."

Vaike shrugged and pursed his lips. "Huh, add a damn to that sentence and you'd sound just like Sully."

"Well, I guess we'll have to leave it at me winning," Chrom said with a smug look.

"Like hell we are! We're riding again!"

Sumia paled. "...What?"

Chrom jumped at the opportunity and sprinted back to the line without hesitation, leaving Sumia to sigh heavily.

"Why don't we just go to the lazy river without them?" Severa asked, stomping her foot in frustration. "My feet are tired and I'm sick of waiting in lines and I just wanna rest!"

Sumia nodded agreement. "Good idea, kid. Maybe we should..." Her sentence trailed off and her eyes went wide.

"So we're going? Good," Severa shrugged, starting to walk onward.

Gregor looked at Sumia with a worried look. "Severa, hold, I think something is wrong."

Sumia stumbled back into her seat and heaved a sigh. "Oh no...this is not happening right now."

"Oh dear..." Gregor broke out into a sweat and looked towards the racing slide, which Chrom and Vaike had just disappeared around the corner to get on. "...And they're gone." He muttered something in German that Laurent gasped at. "...Er, you weren't supposed to hear that."

Minutes later, Chrom and Vaike came running again, one in noticeably higher spirits than the other. "That one was unmistakably my win," Chrom said happily as Vaike slouched his shoulders.

The look on Gregor's face told Chrom something was very wrong, and he dropped his happy demeanor. "What happened?"

Sumia groaned, her pain only having gotten worse in the time it took them to come back. "Chrom, it's happening."

Now it was Chrom's turn to go pale. "What day is it," he asked no one in particular.

Laurent spoke up, useless facts like this being his specialty. "It's the 14th."

"That doesn't make any sense," Sumia groaned. "My due date isn't for another two weeks."

Laurent cocked his head to the side curiously. "Father, did mother not say that babies tend to be born faster the second time around?"

Gregor raised an eyebrow at his son. "How are you knowing that?"

Meanwhile, Chrom's shoulders slumped and he put an arm around Sumia. "Oh gods, we have to go, _now_."

Severa crossed her arms and pouted. "So does this mean I can't go to the lazy river yet?"

Vaike raised his hand, which had a wristband around it. "Our locker's connected t' me, so y'all can go ahead. I'll head back with these two and meetcha there."

Lucina jumped and patted her mother's belly soothingly. "I can't wait to meet my brother or sister! Can I come too?"

Chrom shook his head. "We brought Vaike along for exactly this reason. We won't put your fun day to a premature end, so you go on ahead, okay."

Lucina nodded. "Okay. Love you mom, love you dad."

"I love you too," Sumia promised. "I'd bend down to kiss you, but I'm in too much pain to even think about that."

With that, Chrom, Sumia and Vaike rushed to the lockers holding their stuff so the former two could change and leave. "Guess we'll hafta wait 'till next time for our tiebreaker," Vaike said.

Chrom scoffed. "What tie? I beat you twice!"

Fed up with the competition, Sumia screeched, "I'll beat you _both_ twice if we don't get me to a hospital _now_!"

That put the spring Chrom and Vaike needed in their step, and they scurried out of the water park as quickly as they could. Lucina knew she should have been worried about her mom's well being in this time of giving birth, but she only had more fun during the rest of her day at the water park, happy to be spending time with her friends and eager to meet her new sibling when she went home. Once everything was said and done, Vaike walked her to his car, her jumping in and clapping her hands. "So can we go see mom now?"

Vaike shrugged. "I...I actually dunno, kiddo. I was told to take you home if this kinda thing happened, but I can see why ya wanna go see her, and I shouldn't leave ya home alone..."

Lucina nodded and supplied, "and how are we gonna get in? I don't have a house key."

After a silent moment of turning onto a busy road, Vaike grinned and said, "to the hospital it is! Sit tight and buckle in, Lucy, Teach'll get ya there in a jiffy."

"Yay!"

Once they arrived, Lucina leapt from the car and scampered into the hospital to see her parents. She and Vaike quickly ran into Chrom in the waiting room, who was confused to see them. "Er, didn't I tell you to take her home?"

Vaike shrugged. "Your little girl's very persuasive."

Lucina nodded with a grin and said, "also, you didn't give me a house key, so I couldn't go home."

Chrom slapped his forehead and sighed. "Damn it, how could I overlook that?"

Vaike laughed and ruffled Lucina's hair. "Well, either way, there was no way Teach could take this opportunity from her."

Chrom narrowed his eyes at Lucina. "You're lucky you don't have school tomorrow, young lady. We'll likely be here all night, so you'll be staying here so Vaike can go home."

In response to his name being mentioned, Vaike saluted at Chrom. "Thanks, man!" After saying goodbye and wishing them luck, he left for home.

The night was a long one, but just a little bit before midnight, a bouncing baby girl entered the family's life, immediately meeting her doting mother, loving father and overjoyed sibling. The day of her birth was a joyous occasion for Lucina, both in that she got to go to a water park for the first time and get a new sibling.

And it made for an excellent story when Cynthia was first taken to a water park.

* * *

 **This was written as a request concocted by my girlfriend while we ourselves were at a water park, so I drew a bit from our recent experiences. I hope you enjoyed this c:**


End file.
